AMERICA/PERU - The rosary and a statue of Our Lady are the banners of a successful Great City Mission, ‘put out to sea’ in Lima, capital of Peru

Friday, 16 July 2004

Lima (Fides Service) - Praying a Dawn Rosary is a custom which is increasingly popular among families Lima as part of the City Mission “Put out to Sea”. Very early before dawn more and more people gather at home or in the open to pray the rosary before beginning their day. Lima’s Great City Mission is proving a success, the Archdiocesan Press Office informed Fides.
It is 5.30 in the morning in the Rimac district of Lima and the bells of St Juan Battista de Amancaes begin to ring. People come out of the houses and go to the church square. A few yards on a whistle blows and people come out of the houses with their rosaries in hand. Even on Saturdays the story is the same. For some time now the parish priest Father Luis Amaro Gamarra and a group people have been meeting to pray the dawn rosary. Father Luis Amaro Gamarra tells us about the city mission. “More than 100 city missionaries, aged 16 to 60, in groups of three, go on mission to homes from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. when people are more likely to be at home. The families are expecting the missionaries because the evening before a person comes to announce the visit, the them for reflection and to leave a statue of Our Lady in the home. The missionaries are made welcome and together, missionaries and family, pray and reflect on a Gospel passage or Church teaching chosen as the theme of the day. At the end of the visit the statue of Our Lady is taken to another home where the missionaries will go the next evening. The aim of these visits is to encourage people to put into practice the passage for reflection. There is time for questions and answers and the meeting concludes with a prayer.” The month of July is dedicated to the theme: “Mission in the Third Millennium” with reflections on Redemptoris Missio encyclical and the post-synodal exhortation e Ecclesia in America.
In St Peter’s parish in the Chorrillos district, 300 animators in small groups have already visited about 1,500 families. Father José Alarcón, the parish priest, says that the badge of these missionaries is the rosary and it opens every door. “The banner of this City Mission ‘Put out to Sea’ is the rosary which we pray and carry with us wherever we go. The Rosary is a mark which is recognised from afar and it ensures that the missionaries are made welcome in every family”.
Father Alarcón said the fruits of these visits are tangible: “The missionaries make bonds of friendship as they visit families even with those people who for various reasons have fallen away from the Church. We are beginning to see new faces in the church and in parish activities. We tell the new arrivals that everyone has a place in the Church and that they too can be active in the Great Mission and many are joining us to help announce throughout our city the Good news of Jesus Christ”. (R.Z.) (Agenzia Fides 16/7/2004; Righe 36 - Parole 530)


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